HR Recession - 5 Ways to Keep a Job During a Recession.

Tips for Improving Job Performance.

In the turbulent, toss-about world of work in America, all kinds of people are worried about getting fired. Who among us hasn't seen a helpful, smart, hard-working person get laid off? Being let go is not for last place performers anymore. Everyone is at risk.

Can you avoid the pink slip? You can sure try. While no one may guarantee you a gig these days, here are five ways to keep your job during a recession and improve your job performance.

1. Talk Directly to Your Manager About How to Improve Job Performance

Lay it all out on the table and sincerely ask for advice from your boss about your situation. You're not asking them to butter you up or paint a rosy picture. You're asking for the truth.

Ron Mitchell, career coach and founder and CEO of New York City-based Gotta Mentor, advises on some good questions to ask your boss regarding job performance, "You should take control of this process. In this meeting you should ask two questions. First, what can I improve upon? Second, what additional things can I do to help you do your job better?"

Is asking your boss about job performance considered kissing boss booty? Maybe a bit, but your manager is likely under a lot of stress, too, so finding ways to help them and make them look better means your less likely to be sent packing.

2. Learn Other People's Jobs

It sounds calculating, but it's true. One of the best ways to keep your job during a recession is to increase your value to your employer. If you can do the work of two, you have a better chance of out-staying your peers. As with any worthwhile fitness program, you must cross-train for greater strength and resiliency. Sean Ebner, regional vice president of the IT outplacement firm, Technisource, emphasizes why this productivity makes a difference, saying, "Make it so that two people would have to replace your work effort, not just half of a person."

And, once you pick up some new job skills or strengthen old ones, let people know. Executive coach Peggy Klaus says, "Connect the dots for people and show them how your strengths can be utilized in other departments, capacities, or fields."

3. Be Profitable

If you're not clear how your work either makes the company money or cuts costs - or both - you'd be wise to figure that out soon. If you need help, talk to trusted friends, co-workers and even your boss. Letting your boss know that you're trying to improve your job performance and contribution to the bottom line can't hurt. Plus, it reminds them of how essential you are.

Klaus says, "Be certain that the results you are focusing on and producing are the ones your boss and company value most. Translation: efficiency, cost-cutting and revenue."

4. Toot Your Own Horn - Loudly!

No one appreciates arrogance, but staying quiet about your job performance and contributions isn't wise right now. Whatever you do to move the company forward - stay late to complete a project, have a great call with a client, train someone else in a new skill or improve your output - make sure that your boss knows about it. Your resourcefulness and willingness to work hard are attributes most managers want to keep in-house.

John M McKee, founder and CEO of BusinessSuccessCoach.net, says "Successful professionals don't wait to get noticed while they toil away on a project."

5. Rise Up and Take Command

Amidst the devastation that layoffs leave behind, you have a unique opportunity to collect the remaining pieces and move quickly into management. As Allison Hemming, founder of The Hired Guns talent agency says, "Be the phoenix. This could be your opportunity to rise to the top." She recommends that when departments are combined, "Take advantage of a re-shuffled deck. Management will be looking for new leaders to prevail."

Plus, that way, when the company is back on its feet, you'll be a time-tested veteran who helped lead everyone through the worst of times. Your job could be more secure and well-paid than ever.

Are Some Layoffs Simply Inevitable?

All advice aside, don't be too hard on yourself. Many experts agree that you can only do so much to protect yourself from a layoff. Sometimes, even your best won't be enough.

Ron Mitchell reminds you to chin up and stand proud should that moment come, "One thing this current job environment has taught us is that no one is immune to layoffs. Companies have for the past few rounds of layoffs been cutting bone not fat. They are laying off people that have been doing a good job."

Reference:
Bridget Quigg

HRM: Alternative to Layoffs

Cutting wages or hours across the board in an attempt to save jobs would save more money and be less agonizing than layoffs. But too few companies even consider such alternatives, possibly more due to psychological reasons, than fiscal ones.

The recent front-page story in the New York Times followed similar stories in the Wall Street Journal and on National Public Radio and other outlets about companies pursuing alternatives to layoffs that would cut costs in other ways.

I can't remember getting as many calls from reporters on a single topic as I have recently asking about these alternatives.

The idea that there are alternative ways of handling the need to cut costs without laying off individual workers is actually a very old story. In fact, up until the mid-1980s, the idea that an employer would dismiss workers permanently -- that they were not expected to come back after business picked up -- was so rare that the Bureau of Labor Statistics did not even keep track of such cuts.

The term "layoff" in those days meant temporary job losses: Unionized workers, but even some non-union employees, would be paid supplemental benefits during the period of layoff not just to be nice to them but to keep them from taking another job someplace else. As soon as business picked up, the companies wanted to bring those temporarily furloughed workers back as fast as possible, the same workers into the same jobs.

Rehiring took place, based on seniority, in part to make sure that the most experienced workers stayed with the company. The benefits from this, of course, were that the company could get going again really fast, and the costs of hiring new workers and training them were eliminated as were the learning-curve problems of waiting for the performance of new hires to get up to speed.

After the 1981 recession, the term "layoff" shifted from its original meaning of a temporary job loss from which workers could expect to be recalled to a permanent separation with no prospects for recall.

It was in this period that more creative alternatives to layoffs flourished. The most prominent of these alternative approaches was wage cuts, often negotiated by unions under the guise of concessions to existing union contracts, but the goal was always to reduce permanent job losses.

The range of other alternatives was impressive -- reduced hours of work (and pay), job sharing where the same job would be split into two part-time positions, cutting back on outsourced work and the use of vendors to make work for regular employees whose normal tasks were no longer needed, etc.

Given the steepness of the current downturn, it isn't surprising that there would be a lot of attention directed at layoffs and their alternatives. Further, there is at least some circumstantial evidence that the need to keep your workforce together by avoiding layoffs is even more important now than in the past.

One reason is that most companies just spent the last few years struggling to recruit and retain the workforce they need. To lose them voluntarily seems like shooting yourself in the foot. The second reason is that all the liquidity that governments around the world began pouring into markets beginning in September will start to hit the global economy soon, and the predictions are that the pickup in business will happen even faster than in the past.

So here's the amazing thing: Despite the extraordinary pressures to cut costs, the knowledge from decades past about alternatives to layoffs and the contemporary concerns about losing skilled employees, almost no one is doing anything about it!

Literally thousands of employers are laying off employees, but reporters are struggling to find even a handful of companies across the entire U.S. economy that are pursuing any other approach -- even when those alternatives are combined with layoffs.

When we look carefully at the stories about companies pursuing alternatives, we see they are mostly very small, privately held companies, many of whom have never had a layoff in their history. The few big companies that are cited, Motorola for example are, in fact, laying off employees; they are just cutting other things as well.

The best example of a significant company that is pursuing real alternatives to layoffs is FedEx, where they are cutting wages to reduce costs. What is particularly important about the cuts at FedEx is that the cuts are even bigger for executives: 10 percent for executive pay, five percent for everyone else. (Fed Ex also announced for the first time that it will not be advertising in the Super Bowl, another very public effort to save money.)

Why are so few companies pursuing any alternatives to layoffs? Why has the interest in these alternatives declined so much over time? It isn't because the alternatives don't save money: A five-percent salary cut saves much more money than a five-percent layoff because there are no severance payments; the legal liability and associated costs are much less; and the savings come instantly without the agonizing administrative process of figuring out who has to go and getting them out in a dignified manner, etc.

Morale might actually improve through a collective effort to save jobs, certainly as opposed to the morale-killing effects of layoffs and, of course, the ability to ramp up when business improves is dramatically accelerated.

What's striking to me is not just that almost no companies end up pursuing these alternatives. It is that they don't seem to even consider them.

I don't know, for sure, why this is, but it does seem to me that, in part many companies move first to layoffs because they think the investment community wants them to do so.

The financial community isn't especially aware of alternatives and the benefits associated with them, and their focus is very much on the immediate financial performance, not how the companies will respond when business improves.

The fact that virtually every company, despite their varying circumstances, ends up pursuing exactly the same approach to cost-cutting suggests that the processes involved have more to do with psychology -- herd mentalities -- than to any rational processes.

Reference:
Peter Cappelli
[About the Author: Peter Cappelli is the George W. Taylor Professor of Management and director of the Center for Human Resources at the Wharton School of Business.]

13 things to never share or discuss with your co-workers.

"It's a social environment as well as a work environment. However, you must remember while you can be friendly and develop a good rapport, business is business and friendship is friendship."

Most workers don't realize that what they say has as much impact on their professional imges as what they wear. People who say too much, about themselves or others, can be seen as incompetent, unproductive and unworthy of professional development.

To avoid your next case of verbal diarrhea, here are 13 things to never share or discuss with your co-workers.

1. Salary information
What you earn is between you and Human Resources, Solovic says. Disclosure indicates you aren't capable of keeping a confidence.

2. Medical history
Nobody really cares about your aches and pains, your latest operation, your infertility woes or the contents of your medicine cabinet. To your employer, your constant medical issues make you seem like an expensive, high-risk employee.

3. Gossip
Whomever you're gossiping with will undoubtedly tell others what you said, Plus, if a co-worker is gossiping with you, most likely he or she will gossip about you.

4. Work complaints
Constant complaints about your workload, stress levels or the company will quickly make you the kind of person who never gets invited to lunch. If you don't agree with company policies and procedures, address it through official channels or move on.

5. Cost of purchases
The spirit of keeping up with the Joneses is alive and well in the workplace, but you don't want others speculating on the lifestyle you're living –or if you're living beyond your salary bracket.

6. Intimate details
Don't share intimate details about your personal life. Co-workers can and will use the information against you.

7. Politics or religion
People have strong, passionate views on both topics. You may alienate a co-worker or be viewed negatively in a way that could impact your career.

8. Lifestyle changes
Breakups, divorces and baby-making plans should be shared only if there is a need to know. Otherwise, others will speak for your capabilities, desires and limitations on availability, whether there is any truth to their assumptions or not.

9. Blogs or social networking profile
What you say in a social networking community or in your personal blog may be even more damaging than what you say in person. Comments online can be seen by multiple eyes. An outburst of anger when you are having a bad day … can blow up in your face.

10. Negative views of colleagues
If you don't agree with a co-worker's lifestyle, wardrobe or professional abilities, confront that person privately or keep it to yourself. The workplace is not the venue for controversy.

11. Hangovers and wild weekends
It's perfectly fine to have fun during the weekend, but don't talk about your wild adventures on Monday. That information can make you look unprofessional and unreliable.

12. Personal problems and relationships – in and out of the office
Failed marriages and volatile romances spell instability to an employer. Office romances lead to gossip and broken hearts, so it's best to steer clear. The safest way to play is to follow the rule, 'Never get your honey where you get your money.

13. Off-color or racially charged comments
You can assume your co-worker wouldn't be offended or would think something is funny, but you might be wrong. Never take that risk. Furthermore, even if you know for certain your colleague wouldn't mind your comment, don't talk about it at work. Others can easily overhear.

Economic Downturn: Managing Talent

Talent Development...

In the currently changed business landscape, it is imperative for companies to form a strategic view of the risks that would impede on the survival of the organisation. One of these business risks concerns the challenge of sustaining key competencies of the organisation amidst a flurry of downsizing, rightsizing or rationalisation. Developing training and recruitment programmes and focusing on leadership and coaching skill programmes can help to combat the decline in employee quality that will otherwise occur if these programmes are not closely aligned to the business strategy and needs and assessed accordingly.

In practice only a small percentage of the companies, according to various industrial surveys, actually assess the effectiveness of their training investment. At a time of high risk and continued talent crunch in the key sectors of the economy, such laise-à-faire approach will severely jeopardise the company’s capability to be agile, innovative and fast in responding to the market demands. Instead, now is the time for companies to assume a rigorous and disciplined approach to proactively identify competence related risks and to address them systematically in order to safeguard key competencies needed for their business.

Human capital risk, or training investment portfolio management, is NOT an administrative function which can be relegated to the backroom. Instead, it is a strategic function that requires a systemic response from the boardroom.

Leading companies, such as Cisco, IBM, International Paper, concurrent to downsizing, embark on redesign roles and responsibilities coupled with strategic learning processes to improve cross-functional alignment, strengthen performance capability and deliver better results. Training and development programmes help employee morale, increase long-term productivity and provide people with the competence necessary to carry out redesigned jobs that tend to have greater spans of control and deeper layers of process. In emerging economies where talent markets are relatively small, continued investment in effective and efficient training is a must.

Is your training and development process up to the challenge? Do you have the next generation HRD and training management system to deliver results during the economic downturn with reduced resources and to nurture and maintain key competencies for the future?

In this kind of a scenario the answers to the above questions becomes critical and vital for any organization.

Profit from Change - Organizational Behaviour.

Troughs and crests are a part of the economic cycle, however sitting pretty on them is not easy...

Key learnings:

• Change is inevitable. The process begins with denial and hence when one indulges in denial , it is a hint of the impending change
• A successful change process is one that culminates in commitment from those subjected to change

The economic gloom has blanketed the global corporate landscape in totality. Pessimism and dejection dominate the corporate sentiment. The worker population is feeling more insecure than ever and is unwilling to see the positive side of the slump. Despite all the doom and gloom, corporate psychologists believe that there is a reason to cheer. While the sudden slump has caught people off guard, it has also ushered a new and fresher economic inning. The change, as is being said has arrived. And therefore the reaction of people is justified as change in any form first meets resistance.

The resistance one is witnessing is justified as things that people took for granted till very recently have become luxuries. Ever -increasing share prices, steady economy, better pay, and better benefits were the most obvious incentives for the worker population. However, benefits have been slashed suddenly, pay hikes have become a distant dream and job security has taken a beating. With the scenario not looking too promising, the worker population is becoming increasingly jittery and desperate. However, on the flipside is a reassurance that the scenario is better than what one has seen in the past . Jobs are intact. Careers may not flourish but survival is not an issue and things may not be down for long.

Despite the reassurance, there is no running away from the fact that change is extremely draining , especially emotionally. People feel threatened when they are forced to move out of comfort zones. Unwanted or forced change therefore results in certain definite behavioural patterns. People begin to behave in a certain given manner that reflects unwillingness to change. According to social psychologists change, especially forced change goes through four stages before it sets in the new system Each of these stages reflects a certain behavioural pattern that is found in people subjected to the change.

Process of change
Stage1-
Refutation
The first stage in the change process is that of refutation or denial. People subjected to change do not oppose the change but merely deny the need for it. For instance, when recession arrived leaders across the globe lived in the denial mode for some time. They refrained from declaring its arrival. They termed the slump as "just another phase" in the economic cycle and waited for the crisis to pass. However, the realisation dawned when the consequences began to have a snowball effect. It was declared that recession had in fact arrived.
Thus, in case of an impending change, one must:

• Research data and information available and see for themselves if the change is real
• Break out of the comfort zone and seek solutions. Sitting and hoping for things to fall in place would not help much

Stage2-
Resistance
After overcoming denial, people find themselves resisting change. The resistance is not directed at the new ways of doing things.
It however emerges from the fear of moving out of the established zone of comfort. Thus , to overcome resistance people should:

• Fragment change.
• Takinging small steps towards accepting change works well for people who fear venturing into uncharted territories
• Work with a positive frame of mind. Understand that if the change is coming from the leadership then it is well-thought of and sure to enhance performance in the long-term

Stage3-
Self-experimentation
The third stage of the change process underscores the act of exploration and self-experimentation by individuals subjected to change. This is a stage when people begin to choose parts of change that they believe could give them instant results. When people indulge in self-exploration , it is a sign of partial acceptance of change. They are perceived to be giving change "a chance" to prove itself, but on their terms. Thus, experimentation with components of change is a good sign for change leaders. To encourage exploration of new change , leaders should:

• Reward people who experiment with the components of change
• Encourage people to offer constructive criticism in the context of change

Stage 4-
Commitment to change
This stage spells success for the new change. At this stage change becomes an integral part of everyday life. People begin to see the new way as the only way of doing things. The old way is dumped and forgotten. However, at this stage leaders must guard against employees getting too complacent with change. They should push them continuously to experiment with newer and better ways of doing things.
Brooding over change only lands one in a lose-lose scenario. The better way therefore, is to take change in the right spirit and profit from it!

Reference:The ManageMentor

Get the Most Bang With Limited Training Bucks.

It's easy to run a learning and development program when business is good. Growth leads to bigger budgets and new opportunities.

But in a tight economy, job opportunities decrease. Businesses are less likely to invest in new areas.

Employees are reluctant to leave their jobs, but may be distracted by financial concerns. As a result, productivity and performance often suffer at a time when just the opposite is required. To avoid this, learning strategy has to directly support the business.

"Only by understanding a business' most pivotal strategic goals can a relevant learning program be implemented," said Dr. John Boudreau, professor and research director at the University of Southern California's Center for Effective Organizations.

Boudreau said leaders typically are comfortable allocating resources for technology, advertising and other areas because they have well-developed models for evaluation and ROI. But the framework for these allocations often is unsophisticated and not geared toward greatest impact.

"Training can be the first cut, focusing on costs saved rather than value lost. Even worse, organizations may make across-the-board training cuts even though they are certain training and learning are not equally valuable everywhere," he said.

Nail the Basics

When times are tough, it's critical to focus training efforts on business fundamentals: What skills training and development initiatives will address the greatest number of workers and have the greatest impact?

For many organizations, that's managerial and supervisory skills. In white-collar businesses, a significant percentage of employees fall into these categories. Even in manufacturing, retail or service businesses, managers and supervisors are the first line of contact with the workforce. Further, the quality of the relationship with a direct manager is one of the most important variables in employee productivity and loyalty.

Training programs that address core supervisory/managerial skills, such as time management, communications, personal effectiveness and delegation are among the most universal skills and represent the foundation of most training curriculum. Similarly, training around common issues such as coaching, conflict management and team performance represent areas that have near-term influence on productivity and performance.

Because these core skills have proven workplace impact, maintaining funding is easier than that for initiatives considered more speculative, or "nice to have."

Take for example, PHH Arval's fleet management services business based in Toronto. Senior Vice President and General Manager Jim Halliday realized through analysis of turnover data, employee-opinion surveys and 360 feedback that managers were having a negative impact on employee engagement. This resulted in higher turnover and lower levels of initiative, creativity and innovation needed to drive business results.

"With limited training dollars, we decided improving coaching skills would have the greatest impact on improving engagement," he said. "Coaching is about having ongoing dialogue with staff; creating one-on-one relationships that demonstrate understanding of needs, issues and concerns; and providing support to achieve individual and company goals."

Ongoing measured improvement - in addition to seeing the positive progression of most of PHH's managers - convinced Halliday to commit to continuing the investment as a "must have" for the business.

At CoBank, a financial cooperative serving rural America, there is a commitment to provide developmental opportunities for every employee and belief that managers are crucial to build engaged employees and satisfied customers.

"We believe that people leave managers rather than companies," said Bob O'Toole, vice president of human resources. "To ensure we have great managers, we offer a Leadership Excellence curriculum for anyone with one or more direct reports."

Demonstrate Impact

In an ideal world, every organization would evaluate the impact of its training programs. However, when an HR department is running full steam with limited staff, it can be difficult to find time to do more than gather "smiley sheets" or perform simple learning assessments. These Level 1 and Level 2 evaluations are a start, but they're not likely to carry much weight with a CEO who wants to measure impact.

Surprisingly, few companies assess behavioral change and the impact of training on critical business performance metrics, despite research from Accenture, Watson Wyatt, TRACOM and others showing learning investments have a strong impact and positive ROI.

A down market offers two advantages when it comes to conducting such evaluations: First, if an organization pares back course offerings and streamlines outreach, staff may have more time to develop a thoughtful Level 3 or Level 4 evaluation process and implement it.

Second, if a company is using outside vendors for training, a tighter market should make the vendors more willing to help research the training programs. Learning providers are more willing to step up to keep a customer satisfied and to get access to data showing the impact of their training. At a minimum, a vendor should be able to provide an organization with ROI studies and research to substantiate the value of their offerings. If a vendor does not have these studies and isn't willing to help assess training impact, companies should question the vendor's commitment to achieving anything of value.

In a tough economy, there is more scrutiny on spending and a greater need to make a compelling business case for learning. "But by aligning our learning and development strategy with key elements of our business strategy, it's actually easier to show a return on our efforts," said O'Toole.

Be Efficient, Whatever the Budget

A recent white paper from KnowledgePool, a U.K. training consultancy, said organizations with staff of 2,000-plus can reduce learning and development expenses by 30 percent by following best practices and working efficiently. It recommends:

a) Careful supplier management, including adherence to an authorized supplier list and discount bulk purchasing.

b) Automating training administration.

c) More efficiently managing course scheduling to maximize occupancy and minimize empty seats and canceled classes.

d) Reviewing and modifying training offerings. Course content offered in the past doesn't always have priority today.

Here are some other ways to operate more efficiently:

a) Tie training to specific business initiatives and job tasks. The more talent managers can make training job-specific using workplace examples, the better.

b) Balance internal trainers with outside suppliers during peak times. The "day cost" will be higher when using a vendor, but companies will come out ahead if they limit use.

c) Offer flexible delivery. Ten years ago, more than 50 percent of TRACOM's business was for training programs of two days or more. Today, most are shorter than one day. The availability of modular training, pre-study and follow-up allows people to develop their skills in a more effective manner that requires less time away from their jobs.

At Gates Corp., a manufacturer of industrial and automotive parts, today's environment has meant constraints on training travel. "It's forced us to look for more creative ways to deploy training content," said Kathy Wojcik, Gates' manager of leadership development and learning.

"We're doing more Web-based training, webinars and consolidating training in the field to focus on what's really needed by the business. Self-paced and on-demand learning are also on the rise. We're evaluating the impact of these changes so we can make smart long-term decisions about training deployment."

Support People

One of the biggest challenges organizations face in a down economy is waning employee engagement. Organizations typically don't lose many people during a recession because external opportunities are limited. But slow-growth and a shrinking opportunity pool can cause employees to lose motivation.

If layoffs occur, the remaining people likely will experience fear and stress from the change and risk overwork from picking up extra responsibility. It's important to support employees through training and development.

Communication may initially take precedence over training in the stages of cutbacks. But once people understand the situation, don't overlook how training and development programs can help. Consider:

a) Building core skills such as personal effectiveness, team performance and conflict management.

b) Providing new functional skills training for employees with new responsibilities.

c) Assessing employee engagement to uncover areas of concern.

"[At CoBank], we know our learning and development activities have improved employee engagement. People feel emotionally connected to the business because we invest in them," said O'Toole.

Just as a stock market decline presents an opportunity for investors to regroup before future gains, a down economy presents an opportunity for training and development.

"It's the challenges that teach the best lessons," said Wojcik. "The decisions we make today will shape our future.

Reference:
John Myers and David Collins
[About the Authors: John Myers is president and CEO of TRACOM, a workplace performance company, and David Collins is general manager, TRACOM Training Products Division.]